The Price of Freedom
by PersonaNoir
Summary: "As we break slowly apart like a dried leaf from a dead flower, what will happen to us? Perhaps one will perish and the other will grow again. Or maybe we can be great together one day." England's POV before and during the Revolutionary War. Involves Shakespeare and flower symbolism. UsUk, one-shot for Teshikameku.


_~The Price of Freedom~_

_To be, or not to be, that is the question:_

_Whether 'tis Nobler in the mind to suffer_

_The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune,_

_Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles,_

_And by opposing end them: to die, to sleep_

_No more; and by a sleep, to say we end_

_~Hamlet, William Shakespeare~_

* * *

"Aren't you coming to bed, Alfred?"

I asked him with sincere curiosity, as never before had he refused such an offer. Normally, on cold, dark nights such as this particular one, he would jump into bed the very moment he felt a chill up his spine or the candlelight flickered. I, having my supernatural ties, was never afraid of such things, but it seemed like America, my dear little brother didn't feel the same, and would cry out for me throughout the whole night, his high-pitched voice grating on my ears until I finally relented and let him into my room.

Then he would thank me profusely, and ask of whether there was anyone or anything other than us in the lonely mansion on the outskirts of town I owned, and I would reassure him until he finally fell asleep. I would tease him, just to hear his adorable whines, pretending to fall asleep myself. He always fell for it every time, and I would laugh at his peaceful face in the morning, seeing his hands grip my shirt forcefully. It was a daily night ritual for both of us, and it was repeated every day, at the same time and the exact same way, ever since I met him in that wide open field, in the land he owns and is.

I peered at him with narrowed eyes when he didn't reply. He was sitting down in a wooden chair, the partner to an oak desk which he had demanded ever since I began to impose taxes upon him. He had to understand that taxes were something that one couldn't avoid, that every nation, even I, had to suffer. Even a colony such as himself. After all, he was going to grow up one day, and I wanted him to be ready for the harshness of reality and the cruelty of the others. I wanted him to know what to do.

Even if preparing him meant playing the villain, I was willing to do it. Only for him, and for him only, would I perform this act of self-sacrifice.

The small gas lamp by his side illuminated his face, making him look like a ghoul, a ghost of some sort. A ghost, the spectre and the monster that hides under his bed. I though of how ironic it was in that very moment, in that completely dark, chilling study, how he looked like his greatest fear. I knew that he wasn't truly afraid of the ghosts. He never was. On all actuality, he was afraid of becoming one of them, to be forgotten by his own people, to be dead inside. To be only a memory. To walk upon your own land, and realise, that your people have forgotten you, have left you alone, yourself, to die.

And to be forgotten by your people is to forget yourself.

He turned around calmly, showing no signs of surprise or relief upon his face. He simply looked tired, but the image of his face, a cold, hard one, with his jaw set as if carved from stone, a grim expression upon his face not unlike that of the executioner's at the moment of killing, etched itself into my mind. Never before had I seen such an expression upon his youthful face. But when instead, after a single blink of the eyes, his usual happy one returned, I shrugged it off and left it in the back of my mind, to gather dust.

He smiled like a ray of sunshine (as ridiculous as it sounds, it was true, for he was the only thing that brightened me up in my life) and answered me, and as he moved I could see and hear the crinkling of pages, and eventually managed to spot the source of the sound. He was reading Hamlet, written by a particularly good friend of mine who had died back in the seventeenth century. I wondered why, as he was not one to read such things.

"I'm simply reading Shakespeare's works, England. His vocabulary and spelling is extraordinary, to say the least. Is that a reason to worry?" He glanced back down, as if to catch a few more words, before looking up at me again, turning the page with a careful hand. "I'm quite sorry, England, but I am unable to rest peacefully. I'm really very engrossed in this particular story, and I hope to finish it by today. If I don't, I fear my mind will not ever be at rest."

I nodded slowly, hiding the disappointment and suspicion behind the mask I wore. I held my candle in one hand, as I had never cared for the invention of the gas lamp, and dismissed myself from the room. I trudged back to my bed, a bed that I would sleep alone in tonight. I caressed the wall, my hand moving lightly as I felt every crack in it. When I reached my quarters, and sank quietly down into the soft feather quilt, and blew my candle out as I lay down.

England. He had called me England. I wandered back to when I had brought him back to my house, his small chubby face lighting up at every word I'd said. I had never felt so close to anyone in my long life, so I'd asked for him to call me Arthur. In turn, I named him Alfred, qnd we upheld that habit of ours until tonight. Tonight, he called me England. Stiffly. As if we had just met once, and had passed each other in the dreary streets of my capital.

I felt empty inside, and knew that the bond that held us together had begun to fray.

* * *

Soon, when I returned from one of my more dangerous escapades, I realised that America was getting taller. He was almost the same height as I when I had left, and now, I looked up at him instead of down. He was growing fast and quickly. I should have taken it as a sign, a sign that he was getting farther away from my control, and farther away from Arthur Kirkland. Yet I was and am England, and as England I chose to ignore everything and turn a blind eye.

As Arthur, I didn't. Arthur was aware of everything.

Alfred had a rather peculiar habit. He would wait for my return, impatiently, but nowadays it seemed that he wasn't waiting at all. He seemed to be retreating in the library instead, reading more and more books and every time I came home, he wouldn't have his usual happy face when he opened the door. It was only for a split second, but Arthur noticed it. Arthur noticed everything. But I, England, just walked through the door with a simple customary nod as a greeting. He returned it, and ran back to the library without another word.

Before that, on my old, rotting doorstep (I made a note to change it later - after all, an empire can't very well have a bad doorstep for his enemies to trample over, can he?) I had found a bouquet of flowers, in black cloth. All the flowers had wilted, and I assumed that someone else had left it there long ago, far earlier than my arrival. One of them was so brown and shrivelled, that I could not make out what it was, but the rest were still intact, almost as brown and fragile as the soil I stood upon, so I reached down and carefully, gently picked it up.

_A hydrangea. A lobelia. Mint. Two dead black roses. Two striped carnations. Three Bellflowers. Four Columbines. Five chestnut flowers. Fungus grew on all of them._

Disgusted, I threw them away to continue rotting in the garden. A blemish.

Arthur knew what the other dead flower was, unrecognisable to England, but the feel of it under my gloves told him.

It was a _single, tiny daffodil._ Left outside to _die_ and be crushed under the hands of _the one person it was meant for._

* * *

_"You used to be so big, England."_

I stood under the rain, gun in hand.

I was pointing it at him. The bastard, his face was simply blank. As if he hadn't expected me to react that way. How could I not? He was a stupid child, simple as that. He was an idiot. If he expected freedom, he couldn't get it. I wouldn't give it to him. He was a brat, a stupid, idiotic brat, wanting to live without me. The idea was simply preposterous. Such an unintelligent child could not run a country. Could not be by himself.

After all, _the world was full of double-faced bastards who didn't want to do anything more than gain your trust and then backstab you, and remind you of harsh reality._

Wasn't that right, America? _You_ of all people should have realised that. You, you were just one of them. A backstabbing bastard with _nothing better to do_. Nothing better to do than stare me down, with his face set in that same expression all those years ago. So, he'd become my executioner, was it? The person destined to end my long, pitiful life? I thought of how stupid I'd been, accepting of the fact that one day, he'd break away, and leave me alone to die. That I was just imposing taxes upon him to ready him.

As if I had. I knew I was a selfish empire, taking and taking and _never giving_. Never would I give him what he truly wanted. I would never give him the liberty of having me all to himself for long periods of time, and that was the only thing he wanted, needed. And he knew it. But weren't the both of us the same? Selfish, selfish people, internally and outwardly? We both wanted each other, too much, but our methods of accepting it were different. He wanted to get away. I didn't. And as any empire, or real, breathing, living human being would do, I tried to stop him and _convince him that it was wrong._

But he never did listen. He never did, and never would. Because he was immature, a rare, bout of innocence in a world of cruelty. And I craved the light he shone in the darkness of it.

That was why I fell to my knees, threw my gun aside and didn't kill him. _Didn't stop him._

Because I had accepted the fact that he wouldn't listen. And one day, far away, I would shove it in his face as he failed, as he failed to make the country, the hero he so wished to be. Because he would never be a hero. He would never save the heroine, he would never save anybody. He was a villain, the antagonist as everybody else was in a play, in a book called life. And life wasn't a comedy. It was a tragedy. _A tragedy in which the characters were never sympathised with by the evil writer._

I sat there, in the cold, harsh, unforgiving rain, my head in my hands, the rain running down my face. In my head I was _laughing, laughing at the fact that this- this simple-minded child thought he could be a country without me. Hah!_ He wasn't even prepared for this. I could see his expression faltering, his face softening, the rain making it look as if tear tracks were running down his face. He must have thought I was crying! As if I would cry. As if I wasn't ever prepared for such things. He had underestimated me, and when he fell I would reclaim him, and tell him what he did wrong. _Because he wasn't ready._

* * *

_(I would realise later, too late, that Hamlet was one of the causes of my woes. France, the bastard, had sent America a letter, a simple letter, saying "To be or not to be?" America, unknown to me at the time, had written down "to be free" just below, and France's stupid bird had come to reclaim the parchment, and that was the beginning of the end. The beginning of the rift.)_

* * *

He smiled sadly, a smile that was no longer a ray of sunshine, but rather an omen for what would occur in the future. One that I wasn't prepared for. With that, he simply walked away, his troops following him into the grey, cloudy distance, into the unknown.

_I did exactly the same in the opposite direction._

* * *

Unbeknownst to England, a young Englishman would come to the old battlefield centuries later, in the year of the first great war, and find, in the place of where the sole personification of the very land he stood upon, a perfectly preserved Bird of Paradise flower. A dead white tulip was broken beside it, and a old piece of parchment was folded upon it.

_'I love you, England.'_

_A sole rainflower grew tall n__ext to the tulip._

* * *

_Was it okay, Teshikameku? I hope I didn't do overkill with the descriptions. Anyway, first time writing something serious! Woop. Thanks to everyone who reads whatever stupid stuff I write. I appreciate it guys. Whenever somebody favs, follows or reviews I serious jump up and down with joy and go Woah, people read my shit?! Anyway, thanks again!_

_Right, just to clear up some stuff if you guys really didn't understand what the flowers meant, here:  
The hydrangea: heartlessness, frigidness._

_The lobelia: malevolence._

_Mint: suspicion._

_Black rose: Farewell, hatred._

_Striped Carnation: __No, refusal, sorry I can't be with you._

_Bellflowers: Disappointment._

_Columbine: Faithlessness, the emblem of deceived lovers._

Chestnut Flowers: Do me justice.

_Fungus: Loneliness, disgust._

_Daffodil: Uncertainty, respect._

_Bird's-foot Trefoil: Revenge._

_Bird of Paradise: Freedom, liberty, faithfulness (given by a man to a woman)._

_White Tulip: One-sided love. (It was dead, symbolising that it was no longer one-sided love)_

_Rainflower: I love you back, I must atone for my sins, I will never forget you._

_noir_


End file.
